Windows Screen resolution issue

[360guy]

Greetings

I installed Parallels Access on my iPad Mini. Connected with my PC that has a screen resolution of 1600 x 900. After logging off I was dismayed with how my icons had been moved. In short, I had to restore all of my icons back to their normal position on the pc. Is there any way to configure Parallels Access to allow for a wider (custom) screen width? The product works as advertized but I doubt I would be purchasing it if this issue is not resolved.

Thanks for your attention to this frustrating issue.

Rees in Racine, WI

 

[joevt]

I stopped depending on icon positions after switching from Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X years ago. I just use the "sort by" option to keep them arranged by kind.

I don't believe there's a way to configure Parallels Access to not change your screen resolution. You can change the resolution afterward by switching to Desktop Mode but by then your icons are messed up and 1600x900 might not look good enough on the iPad mini's 1024x768 screen.

You could try a utility to save and restore icon positions. I googled "save icon positions windows 7" and found http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...ore-when/f1299a9d-6dc0-4e5b-9342-ac622bbceaf7
which lead to
http://www.winhelponline.com/blog/save-and-restore-desktop-icon-layout/

 

[360guy]

Thanks joevt. The pc does not have a built in icon sorting option (to my knowledge). But even if I did, I not believe Parallels Access should not effect my pc configuration. But I am glad you took the time to respond. Maybe by sharing these kind of issues, progress can occur. If they don't know about these issues, they can't react to them either.

Thanks again

Cheers

 

[joevt]

Right click the desktop -> View -> Auto arrange icons.
Right click the desktop -> Sort by -> Item type or whatever.

Parallels Access has to change the PC configuration to make it look good on the iPad screen. It's part of the "make pc apps look like iPad apps" feature that you don't get with VNC apps. The problem is what happens when Parallels Access is finished. It does not restore everything that got changed (window sizes and positions, Mac OS X dock auto hide, icon positions). Some of that may have been deemed out of scope by the developers. Saving and restoring icon positions is a not a simple problem - there are 3rd party utilities devoted entirely to that.

 

[lotw]

Right click the desktop -> View -> Auto arrange icons.
Right click the desktop -> Sort by -> Item type or whatever.

Parallels Access has to change the PC configuration to make it look good on the iPad screen. It's part of the "make pc apps look like iPad apps" feature that you don't get with VNC apps. The problem is what happens when Parallels Access is finished. It does not restore everything that got changed (window sizes and positions, Mac OS X dock auto hide, icon positions). Some of that may have been deemed out of scope by the developers. Saving and restoring icon positions is a not a simple problem - there are 3rd party utilities devoted entirely to that.

This is not entirely true. If you are on an iPad 3 or 4 your screen resolution is much higher then your PC most likely is. You can however increase the resolution after running the app by going to system preferences, going to display and selecting the desired resolution. I usually set a slightly higher resolution when testing the app out.

But I do agree with them, turn off the auto arrange.

 

[joevt]

This is not entirely true. If you are on an iPad 3 or 4 your screen resolution is much higher then your PC most likely is. You can however increase the resolution after running the app by going to system preferences, going to display and selecting the desired resolution. I usually set a slightly higher resolution when testing the app out.

The iPad 1 and 2 and mini have a 1024x768 resolution. The iPad 3 and 4 have a 2048x1536 resolution.

On my iPad 2, Parallels Access can transmit a 1024x768 version of my Mac's 2560x1600 screen or my 2048x1536 screen at full frame rate. I'm only guessing that it's sending only 1024x768. If it's true, then Parallels Access must send a separate video stream for the magnifying glass.

Are you saying that on an iPad 3 or 4 with Retina display, Parallels Access will transmit a 2048x1536 screen? I don't think WiFi is good enough to transmit video of that size (4 times bigger) at full frame rate without some lossy compression.

I generated a couple test screens using DisplayConfigX on my Power Mac G5 since it's a Power PC only app. My iPad sees the 1024x768 image perfectly (note the high frequency black and white vertical lines on the left side and horizontal lines on the right side).

The 2048x1536 image is definitely scaled down on the iPad 2 but at least it's properly filtered (the high frequency lines are now solid gray - not solid white or solid black - also there's no Moiré patterns since the scale is exactly 1:2 in both dimensions). The magnifying glass also displays the lines as solid gray which is unexpected - I think it might be doing too much filtering or using a different scale than 1:1. The magnifying glass does well for small text but not those vertical and horizontal lines.

View the images on a 2048x1536 screen, full screen mode in Preview.app with the Get Info window visible (for the text). Use "Zoom to Fit" for the 1024x768 image. Then press the up and down arrow to switch between them.

Edit: I removed the 2048x1536 image since it was converted by the forum to a 1600x1200 jpeg file even though that doesn't actually save space over the original 2048x1536 png image. Actually the image can't be removed because Manage Attachments doesn't work. I think the 1024x768 image is still useful for testing retina display if you view it at 100% size on a 2048x1536 screen.

 

[lotw]

It is true that it would be sending more data for drawing the screen, but I never and would never need to stream video or audio really from the computer to my iPad or iPhone. I just want to control my computer remotely or check on a project it is doing that could take a long time, like rendering a 3d animation or render.